


Seeking Comfort

by cozy_socks29, paintingsinthedark



Category: Criminal Minds (US TV)
Genre: F/M, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-21
Updated: 2020-12-22
Packaged: 2021-02-23 13:48:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 8,562
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23245732
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cozy_socks29/pseuds/cozy_socks29, https://archiveofourown.org/users/paintingsinthedark/pseuds/paintingsinthedark
Summary: Spencer and Emily have always been outsiders, but their friendship develops when they find new ways to relieve stress with each other.
Relationships: Aaron Hotchner & David Rossi, Derek Morgan & Spencer Reid, Emily Prentiss & The BAU Team, Emily Prentiss/Spencer Reid, Penelope Garcia & Derek Morgan, Penelope Garcia & Emily Prentiss, Spencer Reid & The BAU Team
Comments: 27
Kudos: 54





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Rose: So I would like to apologize for this work in general. I’m a little obsessed with the Prentiss/Reid dynamic and have read all of the other fics available, so I made my own. I just needed to write down ideas from my head, so please don’t kill me. This is my first time writing anything like this, so any comments are greatly appreciated. I definitely take inspiration from other works on here, so many thanks to all other authors. Thanks to anyone reading! Btw paintingsinthedark is beta-ing/ co-writing/ in general being a very awesome human so this is updated since first posted.
> 
> Q: Hello! I don't really write in this fandom, but Rose needed someone to write shameless smut so I went through and...ended up editing the entire thing. So we're co-writing! Welcome to our fic, I hope you like it, please leave kudos and comments if you enjoyed and have suggestions (which to be fair, may or may not be taken but we appreciate them anways)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Now there are two authors! paintingsinthedark's name is Q, and please_excuse_mywriting is Rose.
> 
> Edit: As of May 8th. 2020, we’ve decided to enable comment moderation. We have never claimed to be canon-compliant, and while suggestions are welcome, we want to remind you that you've made the choice to read this, so we do request that you are respectful. Constructive criticism is appreciated, but yelling about authorial decisions is not.  
> To everyone with positive comments, we love and appreciate you. Thank you so much!  
> -Rose and Q

**Prentiss**

Emily’s week has been shit. The team’s most recent case is solved, but they’re leaving behind seven dead children. Her mother’s been calling her, but talking to her mother requires a strength she does not quite possess at the moment. It’s Friday, by now, and they’re on the jet home. Images of the dead children keep flashing across her mind. She knows it isn’t only her, though. Looking around the jet, she sees Hotch, talking quietly on the phone. J.J. is also on the phone, speaking loudly enough that everyone can tell that it’s Will. Morgan and Garcia are over on a couch, flirting. Rossi is snoring in his seat, next to Reid, who has been hunched violently over his book for so long that a backache is inevitable. This is all expected. They’ve been a team for long enough to learn everyone else’s habits, their end-of-case coping mechanisms. 

Because they’ve been together so long, she can tell you exactly what will happen when they get back. Rossi will go out, charm some random woman into coming home with him for a night. Morgan and Garcia find a bar or restaurant to hang out at, be it together or alone. Mostly together. Hotch and J.J. will go home to their spouses, their children. Reid… she’s never quite sure what he does, just like she’s never quite sure what she’ll do. Tonight, she’ll probably head home, eat some ice cream. Watch Amelié, or some other comforting activity. Pet Sergio. 

She feels a connection with Reid, knowing they’re both going home to empty apartments.

Her brain’s background monologue is interrupted by the vibration of her cell phone against her leg. She desperately hopes it’s not her mother, calling again, but when she checks she sees that it’s a notification from the film store she tends to rent from. Le jour se lève, which she’s been trying to rent for months, is finally available. 

This clarifies her plans. When the jet lands, she’ll go pick up her movie, and head home to go watch it. With the comfort of a plan for the night, she slides down in her chair and drifts into an uneasy sleep. 

**Reid**

Spencer can’t help but feel alone again. Here, in the jet, he is surrounded by his closest friends, but he feels disconnected from them, isolated by his emotions. The past few days have been difficult for everyone. He’s taking it a little worse than the rest of them, but he’s trying to hide it. Pretending to be immersed in a book that he’s read more times than he cares to count, memories of his childhood are flooding in. Memories of having to fend for himself and his mom, just like the kids from the case. Of being bullied relentlessly. He knows how they felt, and seeing it happen to them, hearing about it… now that he’s got the time for it to happen, it’s all coming back. 

He knows that it’s not uncommon, but he’s never been able to stop himself from connecting to the victims. He wonders how others can. Take Rossi, slumbering away next to him. Spencer wishes, desperately, that he could do that. That he could fall into this… happy, peaceful sleep that Rossi is always able to achieve.

Rossi is the only one that can accomplish it, but it doesn’t stop the wish from existing. Most of the team normally try to avoid sleeping on the jet after cases like this. Spencer should know, he’s been teased about it multiple times. Sleep, especially the deep, dreaming sleep they all need, generally ends up poorly when they are on the jet. Snoring, drooling, sleep talking, nightmares, these things dissuade them from trying, lest they let on how much they are affected by the cases. In fact, as he ponders this further, he realizes that it is normally Prentiss and Hotch, both always composed, that avoid sleeping on the jet. He knows he has certainly made the mistake of falling asleep, and he has seen Morgan and J.J. do this as well. But Hotch and Prentiss ... Well he’s not sure if Hotch _ever_ sleeps, to be honest. He’s only known Prentiss for a few years now, but she seems to often strive for Hotch’s level of composure and professionalism, despite her clear overcompensation in an attempt to fit in with the rest of the team.

It’s this thought that causes him to notice Prentiss, drifting into sleep on the other side of the plane. Her sleep, unlike Rossi’s, is clearly neither happy nor peaceful. Her face scrunches up, and she murmurs to herself in a foreign language that he’s fairly certain is Arabic. Her face turns worried, scared. He glances around the jet to see if anyone else has noticed Prentiss losing some of her composure. Nobody else _is_ watching her. They’re all engaged with phone calls or other people, buried in their own guilt. He can’t blame them. He is too. He does, however, begin to worry about Prentiss. She’s usually so composed, never losing control, no matter the circumstances. Unshakeable, that’s the definition of Prentiss. 

Her loss of composure, even if it was in sleep—the fact that she even allowed herself to sleep on the jet—was disturbing. She must be either stressed or tired beyond belief. He sets his book down, too exhausted to bother with the pretense of reading it. When he looks back up, he sees Prentiss jump. Breathe in harshly, open her eyes. The fear he sees in them, so uncharacteristic of her, frightens him. He gets up and moves towards her, slowly, like one would a frightened animal. 

**Prentiss**

_Fuck!_ Emily jerks awake from a nightmare of her mind's own creation. She knew she shouldn’t try to sleep on the jet, in front of the other profilers, but she hadn’t been able to sleep in the last hotel. She quickly glances around, hoping nobody noticed, but it was too late. Reid is standing up, walking towards her with an odd expression on his face. He sits next to her after asking permission, quietly asking her if she’s ok.

“I’m fine, sorry. Just a dream,” she says, body tense. She hopes they land soon.

“Are you sure?” Reid asks, not quite ready to accept her answer. She nods, and he seems to decide not to push her. 

“So...” He shifts in his seat, looks down at his hands. “Any plans for when you get home?” 

“Yes, actually, I’ve finally acquired Le jour se lève, so I’ve got a couch with my name on it,” she responds. Reid looks at her.

“Le jour se lève? It's so good, but I haven’t seen it in forever!”

“I didn't know you watched French films!”

“Yeah, my mom started me on them and I still watch them sometimes for the nostalgia.”

It is at this moment that the pilot tells them they are descending, so Reid heads back to his spot to buckle in before Emily can reply. _Huh,_ she thinks. _Maybe we are more alike than I thought_.

By the time they leave the plane, her watch is telling her that it’s slightly after midnight. She decides to head straight home, leaving her movie plans for tomorrow. 

When she gets home, she falls into bed, barely able to take her shoes off before her head hits the pillow and she’s out. Her sleep is still restless, plagued by nightmares. 

  
  



	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> More of the stuff in my brain happens on paper. -Rose  
> This was fun to edit -Q

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here I am again, posting against my better judgement. Please enjoy, remember I’m new to this, and let me know if you like it. -Rose  
> Here she is, posting again, totally within her better judgement. Comment respectfully please :) -Q

**Prentiss**

Emily jerks out of bed, the shrill beeping of her late alarm jolting her out of sleep. This is an unusual occurrence for her, as she's trained herself to wake up on time and with the slightest of disturbances.

Scolding herself, she drags her sore, tired body out of bed. It’s clear that it will be a long day. 

By the time she arrives at the BAU, she has showered, changed, and fed Sergio. She’s fifteen minutes late and four coffees ahead of schedule. Luckily, they don’t have any new cases today, just paperwork, so her unusual tardiness goes mostly unnoticed. With a sigh of relief, she sinks into her chair and begins to slog through the relentless onslaught of bureaucracy. 

**Reid**

Despite his restless sleep, a bit of irony he would find quite amusing were it not draining him of energy, Spencer wakes up slightly earlier than usual. He’s the second person to arrive at the BAU, beaten only by Hotch. To be fair, he’s not entirely sure Hotch ever does actually leave. He’s over half done with the required paperwork by the time Prentiss walks in. He notices this, he tells himself, due to his observational skills, and the fact that she sits next to him, not because he spends time looking for her or anything.

When she slides into her chair with a noise he categorizes as half groan, half sigh, it occurs to him that her uncharacteristic lateness may indicate that the nightmare incident on the plane last night was not an isolated event. This hypothesis prompts him to reach into his desk and pull out the chocolate bar he keeps as a backup measure for helping JJ, Garcia and/or Prentiss, as he’s observed that chocolate seems to have a rather strong calming effect on all three. He stands up, walks past the divider in between their desks, and hands her the chocolate without a word. She looks up at him, confused. 

“I..uh...thought you might want that since, y’know, you seem tired…” 

“Do I look that bad?” Prentiss responds. Spencer blushes. That was _not_ what he meant to imply.

“No, no, it’s just that you are late and you aren’t normally late and your posture is unusually slumped and your makeup is heavier than usual, which gives me the impression you were trying to hide something today.”

“Oh... well. Thank you for the chocolate,” Her head tilts and a tiny furrow appears between her brows. He wonders why he’s paying this much attention to a tiny brow furrow, but then he shoves it to the back of his head, never to be thought about again. 

“I’m sorry.” Spencer shakes his head, embarrassed. “I didn’t mean to profile you.” He hadn’t meant to tell her all that, and hadn’t even meant to build a baseline of her behavior, it was just that he found himself observing her more often then he cared to admit. So then his mouth opens again, and he goes, “Clearly, I’m the rule-breaking bad boy with the mysterious past. Can you pass me my leather jacket and motorcycle keys, please?” He pauses, then reiterates, “I truly am sorry.”

“You aren’t the only one who’s got profiles of the team.” She tips her head at him, ignoring the rest of his word vomit. 

Grateful that she didn’t acknowledge his (painful, so painful) attempt at a joke, he replies with only, “Fair enough,” which ends up signals the end of the conversation. 

Spencer heads back to his desk, brain unable to let go of his poor timing and flat joke. He’s still unsure if it was right to approach her and acknowledge her exhaustion, and attempts to finish up the rest of his paperwork. 

**Prentiss**

Emily sits, staring at the mountain of paperwork on her desk, and takes a bite of the chocolate Reid gave her. As she lets it melt in her mouth, she considers the ramifications of his actions. She knows that Reid is a genius, and a very good profiler. But she normally thinks of him as less observant of other people, probably a result of his social awkwardness. Thus, her confusion at his actions. She decides she probably does look fairly tired, and since he saw her nightmare on the plane, he came to the obvious conclusion. Resolving to keep her mask more firmly in place in the future, she takes one more bite of chocolate, and picks up her pen.

Around one, Reid pushes back his chair and stands up, startling her out of the paperwork haze she’s fallen into. Realizing she is hungry, she turns to him, intending to ask about his lunch plans. When she turns, she notices that he is staring at her contemplatively. She meets his gaze, and their eye contact sends a little bolt of lightning through her. For a moment, neither of them can look away. 

Emily clears her throat, breaking the moment, and inquires about food. He turns around, calling to Morgan, and the three settle on a nearby Mexican place. They decide to walk, and are heading out when Emily notices that Garcia is absent. She tells Reid and Morgan to go on ahead to get a table while she goes to tear Garcia away from her tower of screens. Sans men, they make the walk to the restaurant. 

Whilst they’re walking and chatting, Garcia inquires about the movie that she had been wanting, and if the film store had it in yet?

“Yeah! I’m picking it up on my way home. You know what’s weird? Reid’s seen it too!”

“Yeah, that’s totally weird!” Garcia looks away, hiding her I-am-so-plotting-something face from Emily. “You should invite him over to watch it with you, he could provide a whole new perspective on it.”

“Ehhhh….” Emily sticks her hands in her pockets. “I feel like that’d be...awkward. We haven’t really hung out alone. Do you think he’d even come?”

“Emily. Of course he’d come! He likes you, and you both like snobby French movies!”

“Maybe,” she replies, as she begins to consider how, or if, she’d ask him.

~*~*~*~

Emily stretches, pushing her arms over her head. She’s done with her paperwork, finally. Reid catches the corner of her eye, and she turns to look at him. He’s reading, again. She makes a snap decision. “So, Reid,” she says, catching his attention.

“Yeah?” 

“So, you know how I’ve rented Le jour se lève?”

“Yeah…” He’s spun his chair around, facing her fully. 

“I was wondering if you’d like to come over tonight to watch it?” It’s a venture, and she’s more than a bit afraid of rejection, but her mask is still in place. 

“Uh… I would love to,” he says, scratching his cheek, “but I’ve already agreed to babysit for J.J. tonight. Would another time work?” 

“Yes, of course, sure,” Emily replies, hiding her disappointment. She tells him she should get back to work, and turns back to her desk. “I really should get more friends who speak French,” she says quietly to herself, attempting to justify her irrational emotions.

She gets up a few minutes later to give Hotch her pile of paperwork, and heads out for the night. As she grabs her stuff, she says goodbye to them all, with unusual awkwardness where Reid is concerned.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this one is quite short, that’s just how it decided to be. -Both of us :)

**Reid**

After Prentiss leaves, Spencer looks at the clock and realizes that it’s already 7:30. Once again, he has lost track of time. He realizes he’s actually hungry, and so goes to turn in his paperwork to Hotch. Unfortunately, Hotch is already engaged in conversation with Rossi, as they discuss Emily’s paperwork and her reviews from the last P.D. He knows he should probably (definitely!) turn around and go back to his desk, and he’s doing this very thing when he hears a word that spikes his attention. 

“...even told them she was dating Sergio.” he hears Hotch say.

This, of course, captures his curiosity and he decides that eavesdropping here would be a completely ordinary occurrence, like how Morgan and Garcia get all that gossip, and really, just a second more couldn’t hurt.

“Isn’t that her cat?” Rossi replies with a slight chuckle, to which Hotch only nods and seems to repress his own laugh. He can’t help it. Spencer lets out a sigh of relief, which of course causes Hotch to look sharply in his direction. 

“Sorry, sir. I was just... coming here to turn in my paperwork?” He stammers out, wincing when it ends in a question. 

“I didn’t realize Emily had a cat,” he says, trying to explain his clear indiscretion. Hotch only lifts an eyebrow, while Rossi seems to suppress more laughter. He blushes, realizing he called her Emily again, something he was really trying not to do. Calling her Emily only makes hiding his feelings from her harder. 

“I mean Prentiss just never mentioned him” he stammers out, trying to fix the situation. This only makes matters worse, if Hotch’s facial expression is any indication. He decides not to dig this hole any deeper, and quickly sets the paperwork on the desk, spins around and leaves, stumbling over Rossi’s chair. Mentally scolding himself, he leaves to go grab his stuff, ignoring the quiet laughter from inside the office behind him. 

He knows he likes Prentiss, isn’t that clueless. He is, after all, a profiler. He knows that she likes to talk to him, but there is absolutely no way she could ever like him. She’s beautiful, exotic, and he knows her type: big, alpha males, unlike him. 

Either way, he knows, logically, the odds of her feeling the same way towards him as he does towards her are so small they’re practically nonexistent. Unfortunately, this doesn’t stop him from walking up to Morgan anyway.

“Hey, Morgan, do you know anyone who speaks French?” He asks, flashing back to Emily Prentiss’s quiet words. 

“Aside from you, Prentiss and Garcia?” Morgan asks, clearly confused.

“Garcia knows French?”

“Yeah, she used to oblige Prentiss’s obsession with old snobbish French movies and watch them with her.”

“So… hypothetically, if I was asked to do so without Garcia?”

“Then clearly Prentiss wants to spend some time with you, pretty boy,” Morgan says with a smirk.

“Oh.” Reid swallows, flushing as he vividly remembers his feeble attempt to try and dissect her motivations, given that babysitting has been canceled for well over a week now.

“Well, I’m heading out,” he tells Morgan, grabbing his bag and heading for the elevator. “See you tomorrow!” Morgan just stands there, shaking his head at his friend’s obliviousness. 


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The authors play with Morgan and Garcia because we can.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Obviously, we don’t own any of these characters, we just want to give them more adventures. Thank you for reading, and comment any thoughts/ideas!

**Garcia**

“Hey handsome, how goes it with our little genius?” Penelope says, approaching Derek. She saw him with Reid and wonders if it’s related to her “suggestion” to Emily. 

“He’s still...lovably ignorant.”

“He does like Emily, right? We aren't making a mistake here?” Penelope asks, wanting her babies to be happy.

“Have you seen his lovey dovey eyes, woman?” 

Penelope giggles. She _has_ seen the infatuated way Reid stares at Emily when he thinks nobody is watching, _and_ cataloged the way Emily blushes when she touches him. She may not be a profiler, but she is not to be underestimated.

“Then I do believe it is our civic duty to continue pushing them together,” she replies with a grin. She asks him if he wants to go check out a new little hole-in-the-wall restaurant she’s discovered (through perfectly legal means of searching), and he does. She shrugs on her jacket, and manages to avoid taking his arm as they leave.

“After you, my lady,” he says with a wolfish grin. 

**Morgan**

Derek Morgan is tired of his friend’s cluelessness. He’s known Reid for years, so he knows that while Reid is a genius, he’s not always smart. Derek realizes he has it easier than the kid, what with him actually having a parent around more often growing up, and attending college at a normal age, but sometimes Reid’s complete lack of situational awareness astounds him. It’s obvious, to anyone watching, that Prentiss has a thing for the resident genius. He really doesn’t understand it, but to each their own. 

He’s seen her attempts at casual flirting (painful!) and Reid’s utter cluelessness (more painful!). To be honest, he’s not even sure Reid’s ever been in an actual relationship before. 

So when Garcia suggested they push the two together, he was more than happy to oblige. He’s been schooled on Garcia’s whole ‘game plan’, and had the necessary conversations with Reid. Unfortunately, he can’t be certain it’s worked. The split up was a great tactic, but Derek isn’t sure Reid understands that Prentiss asked him to see the movie as a date. However, when Reid left the BAU, he was walking rather fast and mumbling to himself, so perhaps that bodes well.

Derek sighs, his trail of thoughts interrupted by Garcia’s squeal of delight. He turns to look, and sees a glitter booth. 

“Garcia….” He turns to look at her, horror dawning upon his face. “Your hole-in-the-wall restaurant has a _GLITTER BOOTH?_ ” 

“Of course!” she squeals, a sound so high pitched he’s not entirely sure he was aware humans were capable of it.

“Oh god…” he says. “Not again. This is going to be a looong night.” After all, the last time he let Garcia take him somewhere with glitter, he was cleaning it out of unspeakable places for weeks. 


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! If you are coming back to this fic, please know that we edited and reuploaded all of the previous chapters as of May 9th, 2020. To understand the plot going forwards, you should probably go back and read them again.

**Prentiss**

Emily arrives home with a bone-deep tiredness that comes with having barely slept for more than a week. It’s exacerbated by the disappointing weight of Reid’s rejection. “Hey, Sergio,” she mumbles as he walks up to her, plants himself at her feet, and screams for dinner. “I know, I know. I’m working on it.”

After the cat has been fed, she opens her fridge. No leftovers. Nothing edible now or after a few minutes in the microwave. Closing the fridge, she opens the freezer. She can barely keep her eyes open enough to pick out a TV dinner, but she manages to microwave and eat it. 

“I don’t need Reid,” she tells Sergio. “I don’t. It’s his loss, anyways.” Sergio meows at her. “I do not appreciate the back-talk, young man,” she says. He meows again. “No, this is not just ‘Me trying to convince myself’. Hush.”

Slumping down on the couch with a pile of chocolate from the pantry, she reaches for the remote. _I can stay awake_ , she thinks. _One episode. I can do it. I have caffeine._ She flips to Law and Order (her guilty pleasure show of choice), because at least television always has happy endings. She’s not awake for long enough to see the happy ending, given that she falls asleep five minutes in, but she made an effort. That’s what counts, right?

**Reid**

Spencer can’t stop thinking about Emily. He goes home and eats, but only some chips. Despite feeling hungry earlier, the peanut butter and jelly sandwich he had at 4 and his inability to concentrate prevents him from actually making or getting food. He tries to read, but he just thinks about how Prentiss is alone, how he turned down her offer. 

He’s 67% certain now that she invited him over because she wants to spend time with him, although it could be the (14%) chance that she was being polite because he expressed interest in the movie, or the (11%) chance that she just doesn’t want to be alone and something happened that made her not watch it with Garcia, or, somehow he finds this worst of all, that lingering doubt in his mind suggests that it is the chance (which he calculated to be around 6.5%) that she feels bad for him. Emily is such a wild card that he can’t even say for sure what all could lie in the 1.5% he leaves to chance. This bothers him. Reid likes math, and he likes knowing things. He is a profiler, and he’s used to knowing what people will do based on their past behaviors that he files away. All of the possibilities he’s considered would fit in with Emily’s previous behavior patterns, although some would change his understanding of her. 

67% is not a very good chance, and he knows this, so why does he find himself considering the time it will take him to get to her house, the chance she hasn’t yet started the movie? It is the knowledge that he is now consciously calculating this that prompts him to notice that he’s been sitting here, just thinking, for 45 minutes already. At this rate, he won’t be able to get anything done tonight, let alone get some desperately needed sleep. 

So. Because he needs to sleep tonight, and to concentrate tomorrow (NOT because he really wants to see Emily again), he sits up, ignores the slight pain in his knee that comes from not moving for too long, and heads for the door.

**Prentiss**

It’s already nine by the time Emily has fallen asleep on her couch, with Sergio settled on her thighs. By nine-fifteen, Sergio and Emily have been woken by a knock on the door. This is unusual for multiple reasons. First, she doesn’t get many visitors, especially not at nine-fifteen p.m. Second, because, annoyingly enough, she almost always gets texted when someone arrives. This is irritating because she isn’t always paying attention to her phone, and often has social notifications turned off because of cases. She throws off her blanket and is trying to decide who might be knocking as she stumbles over to the door and opens it. Surprisingly, it’s Reid. She stares at him, and he stares at her, and this is when she remembers that she is, in fact, wearing her pajamas. Thankfully, the pajamas in question consist of an old t-shirt and flannel pants, instead of the ones she has with ‘hot mess’ on the top and booty shorts, but still.

“I… thought you had to babysit?” She asks, hoping (in vain, he’s a profiler as well) that he doesn’t notice the blush making its way across her face. Reid clears his throat. 

“Yeah, I, uh, that… got cancelled.” She raises a single eyebrow. Why would J.J. cancel the night of? Deciding it’s not really worth the effort, she lets it go, and invites him in. As he enters, she sees him exhale, and his gaze finally leaves her as he looks around her apartment, landing on the small pile of chocolate with an amused look. Refusing to feel ashamed, after all, _he_ ditched _her_ , she stands tall. 

It is then that Sergio decides to investigate the situation, having been left without pets for too long. He winds his way around Reid’s legs, glancing up at Emily with a look she could swear is mocking. This seems to break Reid’s concentration, and he looks down at Sergio with a little sheepish grin.

“So… about that movie?” He ventures, looking at her with some shockingly effective puppy dog eyes. Emily nods, and gestures towards the couch. 

There’s room for both of them, and although she’s a bit upset she isn’t closer to him, it’s comfortable. She turns the movie on, and they sit there in an almost companionable silence. The film is an hour and a half, and she finds herself glancing over at him way more times than probably appropriate. The chocolate is forgotten as she observes him, studying his face and wondering why he is here. By the end, she is still lost. Confused. 

Somehow, during the movie, they have moved closer to each other. She’s not sure whether this is conscious or unconscious, and which of them moved, but she can feel the heat coming off his body, and they are almost touching. She reluctantly reaches for the remote, turning the T.V. off. It is then that she turns to him, surprised to find his eyes on her. He’s studying her, with a sort of intimacy that surprises her. 

“So… You liked it?” She asks, suddenly uncomfortable under the weight of his gaze. 

“Yes, it’s exactly how I remember it,” Reid replies. He has an eidetic memory, so of course this is true, and the thought causes her to...not quite laugh, but huff and smile. She’s not sure if he meant it as a joke or not, because the generally easy to read Spencer— _Reid, Emily_ —is gone. 

He looks different, and maybe it’s just the low lighting, or her exhaustion, but she swears she sees a flash of desire cross his expression. This bolsters her, and, before she can fully process it, she’s sliding closer to him. She’s maybe six inches away from his face when he begins to lean into her, and her stupid heart gives a little stutter at this, and her brain is having a hard time processing, well, anything, because he’s so close to kissing her. His head is tilting, and hers is making the necessary corrections as they lean into each other, but her brain comes back online just a millisecond before their lips touch. She jolts back.

“Wait!” She squeaks, the flush in her cheeks surely visible now, as she struggles to regain the ability to talk, to breathe again, so she can explain.

**Reid**

What. The. Heck. He watched her through the corner of his eye for the majority of the movie, and he was almost certain that she wanted to kiss him, surer still when she slid close to him, the desire in her eyes poorly cloaked. He’s breathing heavily now, embarrassed. He was so sure, but he should have known she wouldn’t want him. Not that way. He’s made a disastrous mistake, and starts to apologize to her, while planning his exit strategy in his head. She shakes her head at his stuttered sorry, and gulps in air.

“No, it’s not.. I want to, I mean obviously” she gestures to her flushed face and neck. “It’s just I.. look, what was the last thing you ate?”

Spencer is now thoroughly confused. “Um… I had a sandwich at 4 and some crackers before I got here?”

“What kind of sandwich and crackers?” She asks, sounding oddly urgent.

“Um.. PB&J and ritz?” Is she concerned about his nutrition? He’s really not _that_ unhealthy. His confusion only increases when she swears under her breath. 

“Why?” He asks.

“I’m… allergic.”

“To peanuts?”

“And tree nuts and sesame and chickpeas. It’s why I never go out to get Asian food with you guys.” 

He frowns. “But.. you did, in Boston.”

“At Blue Dragon. It’s one of the only Asian places I can eat at safely. The owner has food allergies.”

“Why didn’t you tell us?”

“I… I was bullied, when I was younger, and it’s just something that I see as a sort of vulnerability. I also had to hide it a lot when I was undercover. I’m sure Hotch knows, as he’s got my medical forms and stuff.”

“Ok… how bad is it? Why does it matter what I eat?”

“I’m very anaphylactic to peanuts, I always carry two epi-pens with my gun, badge and phone. It would be very dangerous if I were to be exposed. It’s highly unlikely, but possible you still have minuscule amounts of the protein in your mouth, and there is a very small chance that kissing you would give them to me, which would cause me to go into anaphylactic shock.”

Spencer is just a _tiny_ bit surprised. He knows, obviously, that food allergies exist. He knows that one in ten adults has a food allergy, and he himself is allergic to carbenicillin, as well as latex, so it shouldn’t surprise him, but it does. He has an eidetic memory, for Christ’s sake, and he’s read about them. He knows how dangerous anaphylaxis can be, and honestly the protein transferring via kiss is something he should have been able to figure out. He’s just so taken off guard by the realization that it takes him several minutes to reign in his thoughts. By the time he’s digested all of the information, he notices that Emily is on the other side of the couch, looking incredibly ashamed.

“Okay... So, it’s been over 5 hours now, do you have a toothbrush I can use and some food that is safe for you?” He asks, wanting her to understand that he isn’t put off by this, and that he still really wants to kiss her.

“Yeah, um.. I’ll just go get one for you..” She says, hoarsely.

When she comes back with a toothbrush, he sees the tears pooling in the corner of her eyes. 

“Hey. You don’t… It’s okay. Obviously, I didn’t expect to have this conversation, but Emily, I want to kiss you. If you want to kiss me, then I’m going to go brush my teeth and eat whatever so that we can try this.” He’s trying to comfort her now, and it seems to work.

“Yeah, I, uh, I’d like that,” she says, handing him the toothbrush. Her fingers linger on his, and he stands up to go brush his teeth. If anything, he decides that this was actually a good thing, that now he knows she wants to kiss him and they’ve at least had a short talk and neither of them can mistake any of the events he hopes will follow as being unintentional.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok so obviously Emily having food allergies isn’t canon. However, I do have food allergies, and I’m really sick of people impulsively kissing in books because it’s not something that’s ever going to be safe for me, so I decided to put this in. I modeled Emily’s experiences after mine, and I’m not going to make this a huge plot point or anything but honestly 10% of American adults have food allergies. It's not uncommon and there is little representation in media. For anyone wondering, Blue Dragon does exist, I found it from a list off of Spokin here https://www.spokin.com/top-rated-allergy-friendly-asian-restaurants#Virginia . Sorry if the addition is upsetting to anyone, I thought it might give Prentiss a little vulnerability that we don’t often get to see.  
> -Rose


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Q: This was an absolute beast to write and edit. It's nearly 2000 words, which for us is quite long. I apologize for the late upload, it just... took a very long time to rework. Fluff and small amounts of smut incoming, so I hope you enjoy! 
> 
> Rose: Sorry this is up so late guys, it’s been a hell of a month here, but here it is (yay!). I would like to give a huge thank you to Q for editing this/ saving my butt (especially with the smut. You guys should all be very grateful that you are still unscarred from the original smut. Seriously.) I hope you guys like it!

**Prentiss**

Emily covers her face with her hands. A muffled “ _Oh my god_ ” escapes her. Her entire body is quaking, trembling with nerves. She’s more nervous now than she was the first time she had sex, more nervous than she was joining Interpol, more nervous than she can ever remember being, to be honest. Her knee bounces. 

She can hear Reid in the bathroom, humming softly as he brushes his teeth. She can feel tears threaten as she realizes that she can see Reid here. She can see him here now, in six months, in two years, in forty years. And this is the root of her nerves. 

Emily is the queen of avoidance, of repression. It is terrifying, you see, to realize that you are in love with someone. It is terrifying to stop doing the thing you do best, the thing that helps you cope. To acknowledge that yes, she does love him. And she’s let him in.

Emily envisions her brain as a castle. It’s the best guarded castle in the land, equal to only a few others. It has seven walls, three moats, and twenty seven alligators per moat. It’s got archers and catapults and knights and foot soldiers, and they are all defending the castle. But—Reid. Reid is a servant, invisible to the defenses. No one ever looks at someone who goes unnoticed and goes, hey, they might be a threat to the castle. They might be able to get inside. 

The humming stops. 

The tears get shoved back, the nerves get pushed down, they are all sent to the dungeon. An advisor creeps forward to suggest that maybe she should have told Reid about her allergies earlier. She tells him, not unkindly, to fuck off, because she has to get out of her own head now. His parting comments are along the lines of “If you had told him, you could be kissing him right now.” 

She can hear him leave the bathroom, come back to the living room. She hands him a piece of chocolate. She is picking at her nails as he sits beside her. She looks over at him, quietly contemplative. _He really is quite pretty_ , she thinks. The light is doing miraculous things for his cheekbones, and she realizes he is talking. “—still sure you want this? We don’t have to, it’s okay if you’ve—”

She cuts him off, placing a finger on his lips. She may not be that confident right now, but hey. Fake it till you make it, right? 

“Are you done with the chocolate?” 

He nods.

Her hand moves to his jaw. He puts his hands on her waist, uncertain. 

She stretches up, closing the gap between them.

**Reid**

She takes the lead, mouth pressing softly but firmly against his. He moans, lips parting slightly, which she uses as an opportunity to deepen the kiss. He finds that she’s pulled herself flush against him, nails digging into his back. 

He pulls away from the kiss, gulping down air. 

“Are you okay?” Her nails dig in slightly less. 

“Yeah,” he murmurs. “Don’t stop.”

She doesn’t. Her lips and tongue all push at him, demand from him, things he didn’t know he was capable of giving. He gives all of it, gives it as he finds it within himself to give. He feels himself growing hard, and he realizes that for once, he isn’t ashamed of it or worried about what she’ll think. 

He pulls her around so she’s sitting on his lap. His fingers move up to tangle in her hair, and — oh — he can feel her grinding into him. He groans, arching up into her touch. 

"Up," she says, lifting at the hem of his shirt, so up his arms go. His shirt is flung somewhere on the floor, and he—he can’t think anymore, because she’s mouthing down his neck and her fingers are on his nipples, and his brain has fogged over spectacularly. 

“Yeah?” Her eyes are on him. “Is this okay?”

He moans. She laughs.

“Okay, then.” And her fingers resume their work.

After what could be seconds, could be centuries, he slides his hands under her shirt.

“Alright,” she says, “alright,” and her shirt joins his. He finds her bra-less, and is barely aware of what to do with the information. 

“Do you also—?” His hands gesture vaguely in the direction of her breasts, and she nods. 

“Yes. Please.”

He gently, inquisitively, licks a nipple, and she arches back—

**~CRASH~**

Glass explodes everywhere. 

“Shit! Ow!” Emily sits up. Her face is flushed, her hair is messier than he’s ever seen it— it’s cute, he thinks. It would be more cute if she hadn’t fallen off of him and into the coffee table and _sent glass flying everywhere,_ but some things are unavoidable. 

“Are you okay? Are you hurt? Did you get cut? How’s your back?!” He’s flustered, he’s worried, and he’s still half naked, which he’s quickly becoming very self conscious about. 

“Help me up,” she asks, reaching out a hand. He pulls her upright, looking her over for cuts as he does so. 

“Like what you see?” She attempts a grin, but it turns into a grimace before she can get all the way there. 

“N-No! I was just looking for cuts, to make sure you’re okay!”

She gently sits down, wincing. She faces away from him. 

“I’ve been worse. Check my back?” 

He does, worry still clear on his face. 

After a few minutes, he quietly tells her that she has three small cuts, and he can see glass in one of them. If she can tell him where to find the tweezers--

“I’ll get them,” she says, standing up. 

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah, I’ll— _fuck, ow,_ I’ll be fine.”

“Sure,” he says, like he believes that she’ll be anywhere near okay.

She comes back with the tweezers after a moment, sits back down on the couch. 

He removes the glass he can see. Neither of them speak for a good long while. 

She leans into him, eventually, resting her head on his shoulder. 

“Well. The tumble was unpleasant, but I… do hope we can repeat the activities that preceded the tumble sometime soon,” is mumbled into his shoulder. 

“Clean up first,” he says with a small smile.

“Okay,” she says, “don’t move, I’ll go find you some slippers or something.”

He remains on the couch, looking at the glass that shattered across the coffee table, small shards of it probably still on the floor. 

She returns with huge slippers and a vacuum, telling him they’re an ex-boyfriend’s that she’s never bothered to get rid of. 

The vacuum is plugged in, the slippers go on. She directs him towards a broom, to get the big pieces. 

He sweeps, then she vacuums, then they both get wet paper towels and wipe off the floor to get anything the vacuum missed. 

When they settle back on the couch, awkwardly, he says, “Did you know that manufacturers of glass products in the U.S. report a total recordable incidence rate of nonfatal occupational injuries and illnesses of 13.2 cases per 100 full time workers per year? That’s higher than the corresponding rate for all manufacturing, which is 12.2.” He hopes she’ll realize that he’s really asking ‘ _What now?_ ’

She does realize this, unsurprisingly. She too is a profiler, and not a half bad one, at that. He supposes he’s lucky that the people he spends time with are all profilers, and thus often understand his mediocre attempts at normal, humanish communication. 

He feels the weight of her arm settle around his shoulders, and he tenses, shoulders raising. He’s not used to being touched, and somehow, even though they’d just spent an eternity touching _all over_ , he still can’t stop this knee-jerk reaction. 

She removes her arm. His shoulders slowly revert to normal. 

“I’m sorry,” they say at the same time. He gestures for her to go ahead. “I should have checked to make sure you were okay with that.” 

“It’s okay.” Sometimes Reid wishes his brain would shut off, that he could stop thinking, that he could just...be normal. That he could be okay with an arm around his shoulders. His eyelids start to droop.

Looking at the clock, he realizes it’s after midnight. He’s exhausted. He feels a vague urge to just… curl up on Emily’s couch and drift off. 

He hears footsteps approaching and looks up to see Emily walking towards him. He hadn’t noticed her get up. She looks at him, opens her mouth, and yawns.

He yawns too, and starts to stand up, sure she’s going to ask him to leave, but she just says, “You’re not capable of getting yourself home.”

He looks at her, barely awake, and nods slowly. Or at least, he does a very tired person’s approximation of a nod, which involves letting his head do a controlled drop to his chest, and then raising it again, a few seconds later. “Do you have a blanket I could use?”

“Yeah.” She reaches out a hand. “Up, come on.”

He goes up, walks where he’s led, and then suddenly realizes _where he is_. “Emily! Why am I in your bedroom!? The couch is not in your bedroom!”

“That’s true, but the couch is also a solid foot shorter than you, and I don’t think you’ll be very happy with the number of cricks you’ll have to work out come morning.” She’s been digging in a drawer, and turns around and hands him something. “Here’s a tshirt and sweats that should fit you. I’ll turn around while you get changed, yeah?”

“Yeah,” he says, “thank you.”

When he turns around to tell her that it’s okay, he finds her with a blanket and pillow in hand. 

“Goodnight, Reid,” she says, and she takes a step forward, stretches up, and kisses him softly on the cheek. “Sleep tight, don’t let the bedbugs bite.” 

“Wait, wait, Emily, no.” He reaches for her wrist, and she steps back, looking solidly worried. 

“Oh—I’m sorry, I should have realized, I’ll just—” She backs towards the door. 

“No, no, that was. That was fine! More than fine. I was saying, you shouldn’t have to give up your bed. I’ll sleep on the floor if the couch is that bad. Really.”

She still hasn’t gotten around to putting her shirt back on, although when he thinks about it, the shirt in question is probably a bit filled-with-shards-of-glass for one to be putting back on their body. And while she’s holding her blanket protectively in front of her chest, he still looks. 

She notices him looking, and drops the pillow in order to wrap the blanket around her breasts like a makeshift top while she goes to find a shirt in another drawer. 

“Sorry,” he says. “I’ll turn around now.” 

After a moment, she tells him that he can look, and he turns around, sits on the bed. Her shirt is a crop top, which he’s never seen her wear before, and it surprises him. She looks good. Like, really good. He yawns. 

“I sleep on the left,” she says. 

“Okay.”

He gets up and moves around to the right side. He stands there for a moment, clearly uncomfortable. She’s climbed into bed, gotten under the covers, and is looking at him. He clambers awkwardly into bed. She turns over to face the wall. 

The apartment is lit only by a light next to her. She’s beautiful when she’s sleepy. She’s beautiful _always,_ of course, but she’s especially beautiful like this. She reaches out and turns off the light. He rolls over so their backs are together and does his best to fall asleep, and eventually, he does. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Q: Remember to leave kudos/comments if you enjoyed it, they truly are quite motivating. 
> 
> Rose: Kudos/comments literally make our day and are so appreciated! Thank you to all who have read this and supported us. In the next chapter, we’re going to have a case for our agents. I have some ideas, but I would absolutely love it if anyone would like to send me some ideas we can incorporate. Thanks to all, and I hope we will have an update soon!
> 
> Contacting us:  
> Rose can be found only on email, currently. You can reach out to her at pleaseexcuserose@gmail.com.  
> Q invites anyone who would like to chat or submit suggestions to find them at paintingsinthedark@gmail.com or on tumblr at (you guessed it) paintingsinthedark.


	7. Chapter 7

**Emily**

Emily wakes up slowly, contentedly. She can feel another warm body in front of her, underneath her arm, and the events of last night come flooding back. Ah, yes, the warm body is _Reid_. She moves to shift her arm off Reid, but his hand comes up to clutch at hers. Holding back a laugh, she maneuvers her hand out of his and lays on her back. He’s snoring gently, but he lets out a little whine at the loss of contact. 

She watches his back for a few minutes, watches his hunched shoulders rise and fall with his breathing. Light is filtering in through the gaps in the curtains, and it’s sending the sunrise across Reid. Eventually, she gets up. She shuts the bedroom door behind her, and goes to start some coffee. 

There are no curtains in her kitchen. She watches the sunrise from her kitchen windows, leaning on her counter, while the coffee pot bubbles and burbles away cheerfully next to her. She finds the sugar in a cupboard after some searching. When the coffee pot dings, she pours two cups, and spoons copious amounts of sugar into one of them. 

She goes back into the bedroom. The mugs are set on the dresser, and she pulls back the curtains to let the light fully into the room. 

“Reid,” she says, shaking his shoulder. “Reid, come on, it’s time to wake up.”

He rolls over, burying his face in a pillow. 

“ _Reid_ ,” she says, a little more insistently. “I have coffee. Come on, uppity uppity. Get up. Reid. Time to wake up, wakey wakey!” 

He turns to face away from her. 

“Reid, I don’t want to, but I will sing. Come on. Get up. Rise, and shine, and give god the glory glory; rise, and shine, and give god the glory--” 

He shoots upright. 

“I’m up! I’m up. What time is it?”

“Six thirty, and I have coffee.” She hands him the mug. 

“I hate you, this is way too early to get up,” he says, and downs the coffee. 

She sits down on the side of the bed and sips at her own coffee. When he’s finished, she goes to take both cups for a refill, but his hand on her shoulder and a quiet “Emily” make her pause. She turns back to look at him, and he kisses the back of her hand. She giggles.

“Aww. Hang on, let me refill these. If you want to brush your teeth, your one from last night should be in this bathroom, I moved it when I figured you’d end up staying the night and I was planning on making you take the bed. I’ll be back in a minute, yeah?”

“Yeah, okay.” 

**Reid**

Reid looks after Emily’s retreating frame until she turns down the hallway and is out of sight. He gets up slowly. His arms stretch above his head, and he hears his back crack. He goes into the bathroom to brush his teeth (he’s always had awful morning breath), and when he comes out, Emily is back. She’s set the coffee on the wardrobe. 

She comes over to him and sets her hand lightly on his waist, as if it were a question. Upon further thought, he is pretty certain that it is, in fact, a question, although what she’s asking he’s not sure. He notices a stray hair, and brushes it out of her face. She seems to take this as an answer to the question. He’s only slightly surprised when she lifts on her toes, setting a hand on his shoulder, and presses her lips softly against his. He smiles against her lips, and leans over so she can stand flat-footed. 

Her tongue brushes, once, twice, against his lower lip. He opens his mouth slightly. She nibbles on his lower lip, licks it, sucks it like it was candy. He moans. 

“Please,” he breathes.

“Mmm.”

He can feel her hands, steady and firm, on his chest. They shove gently, and he breaks the kiss, hands out behind him to soften his fall onto the bed. She straddles his lap, and kisses him again. 

He can feel himself growing hard. In the back of his mind, he hopes Emily can’t feel it. In the rest of his mind, he’s a little too caught up to care. Oh- it appears that she can, indeed, feel his erection and is, in fact, grinding down on it. He lets out a strangled noise. 

The phone rings.

She reaches for his waistband.

It keeps ringing.

He goes to remove her shirt.

The phone stops ringing.

She slides her fingers inside his waistband.

The phone rings again.

Her fingers slide out of his waistband. 

She fumbles for the phone. 

“Prentiss,” she says. He can hear the irritation seeping into her voice.

“Hey, Emily. We’ve got a case.” JJ’s voice is quiet, but he can make it out. 

“Okay, I’ll be there soon, I just woke up and I’m in the shower.” Emily puts the phone on speaker and reaches for her shirt.

“See you soon. Pack warm, we’re going to Minnesota.”

The line goes dead. 

“ _Fuck!_ ” 

“She really has _awful_ timing,” Reid agrees.

“I’m going to shower,” Emily says, and heads for the bathroom.

Reid’s phone rings as he’s going to pick up his abandoned clothing. 

“Hello?” he says.

“Hey, Reid. We have a new case, hurry in please. Pack warm, we’re going to Minnesota.”

“Okay. I just woke up, I’ll be there soon.” He hangs up. 

“Emily?” he yells. “Can I join you in there for sake of time?”

“Yeah, okay!” she yells back. 

~~~~~

**Jellybean: Hey, PG. I have some interesting information…**

**G: Ooh? Spill!**

**J: No concrete proof or anything….**

**G: You know I’m your girl for that.**

**J: So I called Prentiss to tell her we have a case….**

**G: Please tell me there was a lady lover involved**

**J: And she told me she was in the shower… but there was someone trying very hard to be quiet on the other end of the line and no running water…..**

**G: Oooh Emily’s getting laaiiiddd**

**J: And then I called up Reid...**

**G: Oh gosh what does boy genius have to do with this?**

**J: Well, he told me he’d just woken up, but I could hear shower water running in the bathroom and he didn’t have that groggy quality that he does when he *has* just woken up...**

**G: OMG. You think…**

**G: Emily and Reid?**

**G: How unethical would hacking their location history be?**

**J: Very, but I wouldn’t tell if you did ;)**

**G: Oh I hear you JJ, I hear you loud and clear.**

**G: Let me work my magic…**

**J: I’ll be waiting to hear the results! :)))**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We apologize for the (long, very long) wait for this. Unfortunately for us, we're juniors with a ton of AP classes, which means that we're incredibly swamped. Luckily we've got Christmas break coming up, so we'll be doing plenty of writing then!
> 
> As always, kudos and comments are massively appreciated and motivating!


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